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Local groups answer need for heating assistance in Maine after LIHEAP reduction

This year has seen a big reduction in the amount of money for the LIHEAP program.

BRISTOL, Maine — Nineteen years after it began, the all-volunteer Lincoln County Community Energy Fund sees no decline in need for heating assistance

“We get a lot of people displaced by medical hardships, accidents,” Robert Clifford, now-retired former president of a local fuel company, said. “Medical has been a real big one.”

“People [may] have money at the beginning to pay the bills, but it starts to dry up with all the bills, gas prices, food bills I think take a strain on as lot of people. So I think we will see that, and especially end of the season when a lot of other programs run out (of money), we will be there to help.”

Clifford, restaurant owner Todd Maurer, and former local banker Charlie Ault started the Energy Fund with a simple idea: Raise money locally through donations and give it all out to help people in the country keep warm. That is what the program still does. 

Ault has since stepped back from the group. His daughter, who now helps run the fuel company, has taken over the duties as treasurer. 

They coordinate with town offices to find out who needs help, then arrange for that individual’s fuel supplier to make a delivery. The Energy Fund then pays the bill.

Both expect more calls for help as winter progresses.

“Another 45 days, winter isn’t over yet, and it will pick up,” Maurer said. “Those people, they will start coming forward. The average household (uses) 750 gallons. LIHEAP will fill half a tank, that won’t go very far."

LIHEAP is the federally funded Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, which is the foundation for much of the fuel assistance effort statewide. But at the Midcoast Maine Community Action Program, which administers LIHEAP funds for Sagadahoc and Lincoln counties, coordinator Michael Pepin said this year has seen a big reduction in the amount of money for the program.

"We are doing about $585 on average, per household," Pepin said. "Last year we were awarding around $1,300 in assistance to these folks.”

That federal cutback means the benefits will only pay for about two-thirds of a tank of heating oil or less than 200 gallons of propane. Pepin said the agency will have to rely on other sources of funding to help those households through the winter. 

That includes the United Way, which distributes donations from Project Heat and the state Keep ME Warm fund to MMCAP and other agencies.

At the MMCAP office, Pepin described the phone calls for help that keep coming.

“I just got all my LIHEAP benefits in, what can I do now? Because that’s not enough to fill that tank, or winter is going to be coming again.”

“We have those two seasons in Maine, winter and getting ready for winter," he added. "We try to assist those folks as long as we can.”

The Lincoln County Community Energy Fund also gets contributions from United Way and Project Heat, but Maurer and Clifford say the largest part of their finding come from local donations.

In the 19 years since the Energy Fund started, Maurer said they have raised and distributed $2.3 million.

“I’ve always said [the donations] have been a little bit from everybody. And that really works. There are checks I get for $5, $10, $25 dollars. And then there are larger checks."

He added that donors like the idea that they know where the money is going.

“We have no overhead. You give us a dollar, we put it back into the community.”

Over those 19 years of winters, they say the Energy Fund has helped more than 4,400 households across the county.

“It feels terrific to be able to help people, some who do know and most don’t know,” Clifford said. 

“You drive by and see them and see healthy kids going to school, see elderly going and getting their medicines, because their heat is taken care of. Stuff like that. It’s a good feeling.”

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